This bill is from the 44th Parliament, 1st session, which ended in January 2025.
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal
This bill has received Royal Assent and is now law.
This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.
This enactment regulates digital news intermediaries to enhance fairness in the Canadian digital news marketplace and contribute to its sustainability. It establishes a framework through which digital news intermediary operators and news businesses may enter into agreements respecting news content that is made available by digital news intermediaries. The framework takes into account principles of freedom of expression and journalistic independence.
The enactment, among other things,
(a) applies in respect of a digital news intermediary if, having regard to specific factors, there is a significant bargaining power imbalance between its operator and news businesses;
(b) authorizes the Governor in Council to make regulations respecting those factors;
(c) specifies that the enactment does not apply in respect of “broadcasting” by digital news intermediaries that are “broadcasting undertakings” as those terms are defined in the Broadcasting Act or in respect of telecommunications service providers as defined in the Telecommunications Act ;
(d) requires the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (the “Commission”) to maintain a list of digital news intermediaries in respect of which the enactment applies;
(e) requires the Commission to exempt a digital news intermediary from the application of the enactment if its operator has entered into agreements with news businesses and the Commission is of the opinion that the agreements satisfy certain criteria;
(f) authorizes the Governor in Council to make regulations respecting how the Commission is to interpret those criteria and setting out additional conditions with respect to the eligibility of a digital news intermediary for an exemption;
(g) establishes a bargaining process in respect of matters related to the making available of certain news content by digital news intermediaries;
(h) establishes eligibility criteria and a designation process for news businesses that wish to participate in the bargaining process;
(i) requires the Commission to establish a code of conduct respecting bargaining in relation to news content;
(j) prohibits digital news intermediary operators from acting, in the course of making available certain news content, in ways that discriminate unjustly, that give undue or unreasonable preference or that subject certain news businesses to an undue or unreasonable disadvantage;
(k) allows certain news businesses to make complaints to the Commission in relation to that prohibition;
(l) authorizes the Commission to require the provision of information for the purpose of exercising its powers and performing its duties and functions under the enactment;
(m) requires the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to provide the Commission with an annual report if the Corporation is a party to an agreement with an operator;
(n) establishes a framework respecting the provision of information to the responsible Minister, the Chief Statistician of Canada and the Commissioner of Competition, while permitting an individual or entity to designate certain information that they submit to the Commission as confidential;
(o) authorizes the Commission to impose, for contraventions of the enactment, administrative monetary penalties on certain individuals and entities and conditions on the participation of news businesses in the bargaining process;
(p) establishes a mechanism for the recovery, from digital news intermediary operators, of certain costs related to the administration of the enactment; and
(q) requires the Commission to have an independent auditor prepare a report annually in respect of the impact of the enactment on the Canadian digital news marketplace.
Finally, the enactment makes related amendments to other Acts.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Bill numbers are reused for different bills each new session. Perhaps you were looking for one of these other C-18s:
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Madam Speaker, I am very entertained by my hon. colleague's speech, but I was wondering when he might discuss Bill C-18.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, I do plan to expand on that point shortly, but before I do that, I want to provide a bit of a different perspective on how important Bill C-18 is. It needs to be placed in the real world context to see how it would protect our national community news agencies and media. It is so very important.
I often will go to a lot of events, as members on all sides of the House do. Often it is the community news people who are at those events, taking pictures, doing interviews and so forth. If it is a local basketball game or championship game at a local high school, it will be the local newspaper that highlights it.
I go to many different types of ethnic events. Whether it be the Pilipino Express News Magazine, Filipino Journal, Punjabi Today or CKJS radio, these community-driven news agencies, newspapers, radio and media are reporting on the things taking place. There are pictures and everything else incorporated.
While visiting constituents in their homes, I often see that they have a newspaper produced in the community. They will show me where their son or daughter's name is in that community newspaper or where a local community event is being profiled in the paper.
It does not matter whether people are from urban or rural communities, whether they are from the east or the west or up north, these small news agencies play a critical role in our community development and society as a whole and, absolutely, 100% with respect to our democracy. One of the fundamental pillars to a healthy democracy is to have a healthy media. That is why the minister of heritage has often talked about the importance of supporting journalism, supporting those news media outlets.
I believe the minister referenced the year 2008, a year when just under 500 media outlets of different sizes from different areas of the country completely disappeared. We should all be concerned about that. Local media is how we often find out about the birth of a child, or that someone has died or an announcement about a parade to be held in our community It is often how we will hear about grand openings and so many other things. Not to mention that elected officials will often take political accountability by providing writing or commenting through local media.
I want people who are following the debate to understand just how important it is that we as a government are here to support our media. We are not the first government in the world to do so. We have heard about Australia and France. I believe that many countries around the world are following the debate on Bill C-18.
I am disturbed by the Conservative Party's approach to this legislation. All of us should be. Is it working with the giant tech companies? Has it been intimidated by the giant tech companies?
The member for Kingston and the Islands raised a quote. I would like to reinforce that. For my Conservative colleagues across the way, I suggest they look at that election platform, the platform that they shared with millions of Canadians in the last federal election.
Page 155 of the 2021 Conservative platform, which has a picture of the former leader on the front of it, says, “Canadian media is in crisis. The loss of digital advertising revenue to American tech giants like Google and Facebook is putting local newspapers out of business, costing Canadian jobs, and undermining our ability to tell local, Canadian stories.” I agree with that. In fact, if I did not tell people it was coming from the Conservative platform, I would feel very comfortable making that statement.
I will continue to read from the Conservative platform. It says, “Canada’s Conservatives don’t believe that the solution is for the government to provide direct funding to hand-picked media outlets”, and I disagree with that as I see the value in CBC and I will provide further comment on that shortly, “something that undermines press freedom and trust in the media. Instead, we will secure a level playing field for Canadian media, ensuring that Canadians are paid fairly for the content they create while encouraging the creation of more Canadian media and culture.” I have some difficulty with some of the things in that statement, but the Conservatives raise the importance of the issue.
It goes on to say, and this is the platform's bold statement, “Canada’s Conservatives will: Introduce a digital media royalty framework”, and that is what we are debating in Bill C-18, “to ensure that Canadian media outlets are fairly compensated for the sharing of their content by platforms like Google and Facebook.” If members were to review Hansard and the debate we have had on this, what are the two platforms we are talking about? Google and Facebook. This legislation is, in essence, taking what is in the Conservative platform.
It goes on to say, “Adopt a made in Canada approach that incorporates the best practices of jurisdictions like Australia and France.” Members on this side of the House have said that. The legislation and establishment of the framework is based on what has come out of Australia and France. Our legislation goes even further. It would ensure there is a higher sense of accountability and transparency.
Let us go back to the last federal election. In that election, Conservative candidates, 338 of them, had a platform document. Every one of them campaigned on that. The legislation we are debating, what we are proposing to do with this legislation, is fulfilling something they committed to doing. I would have thought the Conservative Party would have supported Bill C-18.
Why are the Conservatives not supporting it? We listened to the critic. We listened to a few other Conservatives. We get the impression that they have been intimidated by giant tech companies like Facebook and Google. What is the other option? That they agree? What about the commitment they made to Canadians? This is in opposition to that.
This is not the first time. They did the same thing on the price on pollution. They made a commitment and they broke that.
I would argue that this is not the same Conservative Party from the past. This is very much a Reform Party and maybe even further to the right than the Reform Party was. This is what Canadians need to be aware of.
Why would the Conservatives not want to protect the national interest and give more strength to our democracy by supporting Bill C-18? They have gone out of their way to protect those giants. I would be disappointed if the government were to back down because Facebook says it is going to pull its news ads. I am not a computer tech person. I know there are all sorts of things people can do through the computer and maybe they have ways they can pull out the news ads; I am not 100% sure how that works. However, what I do know is that I am not going to be intimidated, whether by Google or Facebook. If Facebook operators believe that they do not need those stories in order to sustain the type of growth that they have experienced and wealth that has been generated because of journalism that has been utilized through their companies at no cost, I will stand by Canadians. I am going to stand by our democracy. I am going to stand by the jobs and the importance of that industry because I recognize its importance.
The Conservatives have now said they are going to pull all stops out. They do not want this legislation to pass and they have been very clear on that.
I had posed a question in regard to the budget implementation bill when the leader of the Conservative Party had a big press conference. In the press conference, he said he was going to speak and speak. He has unlimited time on the budget implementation bill. He was going to continue to speak until ultimately the Prime Minister backed away and changed the budget, even though hundreds of millions of dollars are flowing through the budget implementation bill in order to support Canadians. A few hours later, that kind of fell flat. Why was that? It was because not only did the Liberals see through the charade, but opposition parties outside of the Conservatives saw the charade and the propaganda stunt that the leader of the Conservative Party was trying to pull off.
Just yesterday, with respect to Bill C-42, the corporations bill, the Conservative Party actually supported the legislation. Everyone supports the legislation. However, the Conservatives want to apply that very same principle in terms of what they want to apply to Bill C-18, and that is to prevent government legislation from passing. Therefore, the Conservatives continue to put up members to speak and if it were not for time allocation, again, that legislation would not have been able to pass.
Now, the Conservatives are shocked or at least surprised that the government has brought in time allocation on Bill C-18. They should not be surprised. After all, they just need to look at their record; they try to frustrate the House of Commons, to deny Canadians the opportunity to have legislative measures that are going to protect their interests. We have consistently seen that from the Conservative Party. The Conservatives put their political party and their fundraising ahead of the interests of Canadians.
Let us listen to the first question, when the Minister of Heritage was answering questions as to why time allocation was necessary. The first person up for the Conservative Party asked why the government was bringing in time allocation, saying that they should be allowed to have all of their members speak to the legislation.
They should do the math. If every member speaks, that means how many hours of debate? How many more hours are there before the summer recess? It is not a question of whether the Conservatives will allow the legislation to pass before the summer break, they want to kill the bill. They do not want the bill, period, end of story. That is their intention.
That is why I posed a question to my Bloc friend. The essence of the question was whether the member believes that the Conservatives, had we not brought in time allocation, would have allowed this bill to pass before the summer recess. If the member from the Bloc were to be honest with the chamber, he would probably recognize that the Conservatives have no intention whatsoever to pass this legislation, definitely not before the summer break. If we did not have at least one opposition party supporting what we are doing, this legislation likely would not see the light of day in terms of its passing.
I need to remind the Conservatives, as they like to remind us, about the last election and there being a minority government. In a minority government, we have to continue to be focused on Canadians, delivering legislative and budgetary measures and working with the opposition. Fortunately, most opposition parties have a more co-operative attitude and recognize that they too have a role to play in a minority government. It is not just the government's responsibility.
The only party that has failed to recognize that fact is the Conservative Party of Canada. It continues to believe its only role is to prevent legislation from passing. Then it criticizes us for bringing in time allocation motions and trying to limit debate on important pieces of legislation or budget measures. It is hard to take Conservatives seriously on things of that nature when we see them delay time and time again, such as with concurrence in committee reports. One of my favourites is when a Conservative stands and moves a motion for another Conservative to speak. Then there is a vote, which causes the bells to ring. Instead of debating, they try to determine which Conservative member should filibuster or they decide we are done for the day and move a motion to adjourn, again causing further delay. These are the types—
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Madam Speaker, I really appreciate the work of my colleague from Drummond.
I will also note that French-speaking Africa is a place where the francophone population is growing incredibly quickly. There will be millions of new francophones in the coming years. That is why Africa and the media presence in Africa are so important. Just as Australia served as a model for Canada, it is only right that Canada should serve as a model for other countries, such as the African countries.
Meta and Google siphoning off all the money is not just a problem in Canada or Australia. This is happening all over the world. Now the web giants need to pay their fair share. By passing Bill C-18, we will set an example for other countries.
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank and congratulate my colleague from New Westminster—Burnaby for his speech. We certainly did work hard on Bill C-11 and Bill C-18 at the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage with the other committee members. In general, we worked in a very constructive manner. I really appreciated that.
In September, I had the privilege of attending Mondiacult, a world conference on culture, in Mexico City. While I was there, I met with representatives from African countries, who told me that they were keeping an eye on the work that we are doing here in the House of Commons to regulate the news sector and the cultural sector with respect to the web giants. They told us that they are watching us because they do not have the same weight as Canada in terms of negotiating deals and in taking measures. They told us to stay strong.
Now we are seeing Google and Facebook threatening to remove or block access to Canadian news content. That is what Meta recently did. I would like to hear my colleague from New Westminster—Burnaby's opinion on this. How important is it to take a firm stance with the web giants, knowing that we are setting an example for other countries and other nations that will soon have to make their own laws?
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Madam Speaker, I think it is a repudiation of community representation.
They have local newspapers in their communities, whether they are in Alberta or Saskatchewan, and that is where half of Conservative MPs come from, and the local community newspapers are saying that they really need this, that we need to start reinvesting. Rather than letting big tech continue to have its way and take money out of our communities, let us have some of that money put back. A Conservative MP who represents that community then says, no, they are not going to. They are not going to stand up against big tech. They are not going to stand up for their local newspapers. They are not going to stand up for their local community radio.
I just do not understand how that person could run for office, say they represent the community and not heed the call from the publications in the community to support Bill C-18.
They will have to live with the consequences of their actions.
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
Madam Speaker, my colleague is also on the Canadian heritage committee.
I really love that he highlighted how well this legislation worked in Australia to support smaller news outlets and how the big tech companies fought back with intimidation tactics. We are even seeing similar intimidation tactics here in Canada from those same big tech giants. At our committee, we saw some of those intimidation tactics.
However, we are hearing the Conservatives using those tactics as some sort of justification to not go forward with this legislation, saying, “Oh, Google blocked the news, so we better get rid of Bill C-18.”
What does the member think of the tactic being used by the Conservatives?
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Madam Speaker, I am happy to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-18. I hope that this will be the last debate in the House about this bill, because, as we all know, it is extremely important.
For years, newspapers have been talking about the importance of passing a bill like this one. For months, the Conservatives have been trying to block the bill at every step. They wanted to block it in committee, they wanted to block it in the House. Now that the Senate has given its preliminary approval and we are at the last step, sending the bill to the Senate for final approval, the Conservatives want to block it again.
I will talk about that later, because it is important to point out the differences between what the communities represented by Conservatives are calling for and what the Conservatives are giving them.
The most important thing to realize is the devastating situation community media are facing across the country. We are talking about 450 local newspapers and community radio stations that have closed in the past decade, losses that have taken a heavy toll across Canada. Why?
We know full well why. It is because the web giants have eaten up all the advertising money. We are talking about billions of dollars that have been taken away from our communities and sent outside the country, to web giants that pay little if any income tax, make no contribution to Canada, and simply want to funnel our money across our borders. It was important that the government took action.
The NDP has been saying so for years. We should have taken the appropriate measures years ago. We would not have lost the 450 local newspapers and community radio and television stations that closed because of the legislative vacuum that enabled the web giants to do whatever they wanted. Finally, the government did something. I say “finally”, because it usually takes the Liberals time to act. The NDP and the Bloc Québécois, through my colleague from Drummond, really pushed for action.
The bill is finally here, but the Conservatives, for reasons I do not understand, have systematically blocked it. Once again, I will say that there are two Bloc parties in the House. Of course, there is the Bloc Québécois, but there is also the “block everything” party, the Conservative Party, which blocks anything that could benefit all Canadians, which is unfortunate.
That is just what the framework would do. I want to talk about what it could represent for French-language newspapers in Acadia and even in western Canada. We can see the benefits for all the regions of Quebec and northern Ontario and the benefits for French-language newspapers everywhere. For them, it will make a big difference.
Let me tell the House about what a difference it makes in New Westminster—Burnaby. I mentioned earlier that a bit more than 450 news outlets have closed over a bit more than the past decade, because of the billions of dollars that have been siphoned out of this country, vacuumed out of the country by big technology companies that pay very little or no income tax and do very little to benefit the country. All they want to do is take money out. Bill C-18 would finally level the playing field so news outlets could actually negotiate. I will come back to the moment when the NDP achieved the transformation in Bill C-18 so that it really would do what it was intended to do.
However, out of those 450 outlets, I want to talk about two that were in my riding, the Burnaby News Leader and the New Westminster News Leader, two of those outlets that simply had to close because big tech was taking all the money out of my riding.
The reason I am supporting Bill C-18, from a personal standpoint, is that I see those publications that remain, like the Burnaby Now and the Royal City Record, doing remarkable work every day, reporting on our communities, and I see new news outlets that are also looking to take advantage of Bill C-18 and to finally start to get the money that has been vacuumed out of the community. The Burnaby Beacon and the New West Anchor are terrific new publications that are really exciting our communities.
The important thing is that, when we see the onslaught of hate provoked by foreign troll farms in the United States or the far-right troll farms we see out of Moscow's Internet Research Agency trying to pull apart our communities, what we need are good local journalists bringing our communities back together. That is the counter to the amount of devastating homophobia and transphobia, the anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, the racism and the misogyny we have seen across this country, deliberately fomented through the big tech giants that do not seem to want, in any way, to stop this flow of toxic hate.
The antidote to this is local community journalists' telling us about each other, telling us about our neighbours and bringing our communities back. For the crisis we have of toxicity and hate, created by the far right in a deliberate way, the antidote is reinvesting in community journalism that brings people back together. Within the four publications I have just mentioned in the communities I represent proudly, New Westminster and Burnaby, those journalists and those publications every day do that work to bring people back, and this is essential. That is why we are so supportive of Bill C-18.
Before I talk about what the NDP achieved, I want to come back to the issue of community representation and what it means when we see Conservative MPs trying to block this bill for months and months at every single step. I want to mention two of the most compelling witnesses we had before the Canadian heritage committee about Bill C-18, representatives from the Alberta Weekly Newspapers Association and the Saskatchewan Weekly Newspapers Association. Both of them said, on behalf of publications from across Alberta and across Saskatchewan, that this bill is absolutely needed. They said there need to be some improvements, and I will come back to that in a moment, but that this bill is essential. They told us to get it passed.
That was the message they sent to all of us, though it is fair to say it was to the New Democrats, because of our long roots in Saskatchewan and also because of the breakthroughs we have seen in Alberta. As members know, since the recent Alberta election, every single MLA in the city of Edmonton is now a New Democrat. There were no Conservatives elected at all, provincially, in Edmonton. Most of the MLAs now representing Calgary are from the NDP as well. There are a few Conservatives left, but not many. That new breakthrough in Edmonton and Calgary is important, so we take the issue of community representation very seriously. When the Alberta community newspapers and the Saskatchewan community newspapers speak out, we believe they need to be heeded.
I think it is fair to say that even though the Bloc does not have any members in Alberta and Saskatchewan, they understood. The Liberals understood. The Conservatives represent those communities, and let us mention the communities we are talking about. In Alberta, Grande Prairie, Red Deer, Lethbridge, and Medicine Hat are all proud communities with important publications, and they are represented by Conservatives. What did Conservatives do? They said they are going to block this bill, that they do not care about community publications and that they are going to everything they can to block this bill, rather than work with the other parties to actually get it through. Let us talk about Saskatchewan. Prince Albert, Moose Jaw, North Battleford, and Swift Current, again, are communities that are currently represented by a Conservative MP who was trying to block the bill that the newspapers within the Saskatchewan Weekly Newspapers Association were trying to get passed.
What did the NDP do? The NDP, more than any other party, brought forward amendments to improve the bill. We wanted the bill to work. The Conservatives have mentioned a PBO report. The PBO, of course, references the old bill. The Conservatives do not point that out, and for full disclosure, they really should say “the PBO report that was published prior to the NDP members' working, as they always do, as the worker bees in Parliament, to improve the bill to make the bill much better”. A PBO report today would show what we did, and what we did was allow for that input of community newspapers.
The reality is that now a community newspaper, a one-person, sole-proprietorship that has a half-time journalist, would be eligible for the program. Because of the NDP amendments, they are covered by the bill. The NDP worked hard to include those smaller publications from communities across Alberta and Saskatchewan. We followed what the Alberta Weekly Newspapers Association and Saskatchewan Weekly Newspapers Association called for. When we put that into place, we made the bill better.
The NDP had more amendments to the bill than all the other parties combined, and we are proud of that record. As worker bees, that is what we do. We take legislation, and we make it better. Members realize that the NDP are the workers bees of Parliament. We are here to get the job done and make things better. Bill C-18 is absolutely one of those examples.
Members would think that the Conservative MPs who represent those communities would say, “Golly gee, you New Democrats have done amazing work again and have made the bill reflect my community's interest. I am going to vote for it.” However, they did not. On the contrary, they said, “No, we're still going to block because we do not really have a reason. We just like blocking stuff.”
There are two Bloc parties in the House: the Bloc Québécois and the “block everything” party. The “block everything” is the Conservative Party, which just blocks legislation, whether it is dental care, child care or providing support to their community newspapers. Conservatives say that they are going to block everything. They do not know why. They just like to block stuff.
I guess the voters will make their choice. We certainly saw in the Alberta election that Edmontonians and Calgarians were saying that they did not like the Conservatives anymore and elected New Democrats right across the board in Edmonton and Calgary.
However, we made that difference and improved that legislation, which is really our job. Now, the important thing is to get it implemented.
I also want to comment about how some of the web giants have been acting, such as Google and Meta, in trying to threaten this country and Parliament by saying, “Hey, we have taken these billions of dollars out of Canada for years. We have not put anything back, as we pay very little or no taxes, but we want the status quo to continue.” Members will recall that they did the same thing in Australia.
They basically said to Australians that they were not going to respect their democracy or their democratically elected Parliament. They were going to monkey around with their algorithms to make sure they monkey-wrench the legislation. However, for members who may be attentive to all of these trends internationally, the Australians said that, no, they had to respect their democracy, and the Australians held firm. These big technology companies were forced to respond.
For example, Country Press is a consortium of independent smaller publications from across rural Australia, which faced many of the same challenges that we have seen with the Alberta Weekly Newspapers Association and the Saskatchewan Weekly Newspapers Association. It responded by calling on parliamentarians to adopt the legislation and improve it. In Australia, it was a similar sort of dynamic with money being siphoned out of Australia and small publications going under, but not as many as in Canada. We have lost 450, but they did lose a lot. However, Country Press came together and now, as testimony before the heritage committee showed, there is a very vibrant news sector in Australia with over 125 publications in rural Australia that are thriving because the Australians held firm.
In Canada, unfortunately, we have seen the big tech giants, which seem to be accountable only to themselves. As I mentioned and will continue to mention, they pay very little or no income tax in this country. They take from the country, and they do not give back.
They are trying to pull the same trick. Like they did with Australia, they are trying to threaten the country and threaten Parliament. They are going to monkey around with their algorithms, but they will call them tests. These are the same companies that do not crack down on the toxic hate that often helps to contribute to their profits.
Just as a short side note, the Stop Hate for Profit campaign has come out of the United States, and the NDP supports it. These big web giants are earning additional money from the so-called engagement that comes from the rampant and disgusting homophobia and transphobia, the appalling misogyny and racism, and the disgusting anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. It helps to foment their profits. Whether it is the Internet Research Agency in Moscow, run by Putin's regime, or the American far right troll farms in the United States, run by Republicans, all of them help to contribute to their profits.
The Stop Hate for Profit campaign wants to crack down on that. It says that what they are doing is unbelievably toxic to democracy and to human rights. Big tech companies say that these algorithms are out of their control, and there is nothing they can do about it. Then this bill comes forward, and is voted on democratically by parliamentarians, and all of the sudden they are willing to change their algorithms. They are willing to intercede, push back, threaten Canadian parliamentarians and keep Canadians from their news sources, to cut them off and censor them by using those algorithms.
There is censorship going on. They are being gatekeepers, yet Conservatives would never, ever say a word against big tech. Not a single Conservative MP has stood in the House to denounce these practices of gatekeeping and censorship when it comes to fomenting hate and lies. Not a single Conservative has done that.
It is clear hypocrisy that they can all of a sudden adjust their algorithms, allowing them to all of a sudden cut off and censor, but they are not willing to do it to stop the hate, and they are willing to do it when they want to disrespect this Parliament. I think everyone can draw their own conclusions.
The reality is that, as parliamentarians, we have stand up to these threats. They are threatening Parliament because we are asking them to give some of the money that they have taken out of the country back. They have taken between $8 billion to close to $10 billion, and 450 news outlets have closed as a result. One-third of the jobs in journalism across this country have been eliminated as a result, yet they are not willing to put back some of the money they have taken from us.
I think it is fair to say that, when the average Canadian is asked, they want us to stand up against big tech. They want us to provide supports to our local journalism sector so that, as in the case of my community, the Burnaby Now, the New Westminster Record, the Burnaby Beacon and the New West Anchor can do that work, each and every day, that is so important to bring our community back together again.
We have been hit by a lot of things in the last few years. We have been hit by COVID. We have been hit by the catastrophic impacts of climate change, including the heat dome that killed 600 people across the Lower Mainland at a time of intense heat. We are also subject to the hate and lies that come through the big tech companies that say they cannot control it.
Now, as a Parliament, we have the ability to stand up to big tech to say, first, that we do not believe they cannot curb the hate and lies that are run on their platforms, and second, now they are going to contribute to legitimate journalism across the country. Whether we are talking about New Westminster—Burnaby, Alberta, Saskatchewan or anywhere else in this country, they are going to have to contribute so that our communities are better and our country is better. That is why we support Bill C-18.
The House resumed consideration of the motion respecting Senate amendments to Bill C‑18, An Act respecting online communications platforms that make news content available to persons in Canada, and of the amendment.
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Bow River because he is a staunch defender of small media outlets and the regional media, the local papers he talks about so passionately. He did a great job of defending them and representing them during the committee study.
Originally, long before Bill C-18 was tabled, the Bloc Québécois's idea was that we should create a royalty fund financed by the web giants' profits. That is not what the industry wanted, so the Bloc got behind the idea of a bill based on what Australia did. That is what the industry and the whole community wanted.
However, if there are smaller media outlets or outlets that are not eligible but are still essential to regional news coverage, then we should implement emergency measures to help them and support them financially. The fund I was talking about earlier could be added to a measure like Bill C‑18. It could target and clearly identify small media outlets, like the ones my colleague from Bow River was talking about, that will have a hard time of it because they cannot get ahead. Once the bill has been implemented, I think that there might be more of an appetite for that type of proposal.
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague. I too enjoy the work we do and our close collaboration at the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage. Most of the time, our work has been constructive.
There is a reason journalism and news are called the fourth estate. The news media has a duty and an important role to play in society. I said “important”, but I really mean “essential”.
If Bill C-18 is not passed, more media outlets will shutter, continuing a more than decade-long trend. The news media are in trouble. Bill C‑18 is one of the tools we need to ensure their survival. If it is not passed, we could lose more media outlets, including regional media, which would be especially unfortunate.
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague. I very much enjoy working with him on the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage.
I enjoyed his description of journalists and what they do for our society. I wanted to ask him what he thinks will happen if we do not adopt Bill C‑18 and if we do not support our journalists. What will happen to our democracy?
Martin Champoux Bloc Drummond, QC
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to pick up where we left off last night.
I have to say I was a little disappointed. We had a great opportunity to debate Bill C‑18 last night, but we were cut off at about 6:30 p.m. in the middle of my speech. I had about 12 minutes to go. The classy thing to do would have been to let me finish my speech before interrupting the proceedings. Let us not talk about that right now. Let us talk about Bill C‑18 for the time we have left because, as everyone knows, the House just voted in favour of time allocation.
During the debates on Bill C‑18, there was a lot of talk about money. Basically, people talked about the financial difficulties news outlets have been experiencing for decades, ever since the web giants came on the scene and helped themselves to the lion's share of advertising revenue. People have talked a lot about money, which is certainly important because that is the crux of the matter, obviously. That is what news outlets need in order to succeed and keep providing the essential service they provide: high-quality, independent, fact-checked, thorough information; essentially, news that meets recognized journalistic standards.
Bill C‑18 will benefit the news sector. It will most likely help save many news businesses. That is the objective of the bill, and I think that it will largely achieve that objective. Today, I also wanted to talk about something else that Bill C‑18 will help preserve or even save, and that is journalism itself. We have heard all kinds of things about eligible news businesses and which businesses would benefit more than others from this bill and from the regulations and regulatory framework that will be put in place by Bill C‑18. However, we are forgetting to define and discuss journalism itself.
With the advent of social media and digital platforms, it is true that we have seen the emergence of new types of news media, new types of businesses, new ways of disseminating information. However, we have also seen more news businesses engaging in what we might call advocacy journalism. In some cases, it could even be described as activist journalism, a form of journalism that involves embracing a cause and using the medium to provide news to the public in a way that is biased in favour of that cause. One example would be environmental journalism. We agree that the cause is worthy, but environmental journalists will always deliver the news with an activist slant. I have nothing against that, but is that journalism in the true sense of the word? No, not really, in the same way that a certain type of media outlet might have a political bent. I know some people will say that CBC/Radio-Canada has a pro-government, pro-Liberal bias.
What is journalism, really? Journalism is a profession that demands a lot of meticulous work and a lot of passion. It has certain standards, certain rules that I would hazard to say are accepted around the world. Its first guiding principle is independence. What does independence mean for journalism and for journalists? It means the ability to work unfettered by the influence of a government, company, movement or cause. That is what journalistic independence means. The second guiding principle is handling the news in a meticulous way. That means having an almost obsessive passion for truth-seeking and fact-checking, while remaining objective.
The other guiding principle is respect for individuals and groups and respect in handling sources.
These are the guiding principles of the journalism profession. I am not saying that advocacy journalism, activist journalism or opinion journalism are bad. However, they are not necessarily what we are trying to protect through Bill C‑18. That is why we included eligibility criteria in Bill C‑18. News outlets eligible under the regulatory framework proposed by Bill C‑18 will have to espouse a code of ethics. The code in question may not necessarily mirror the journalistic standards and practices of CBC/Radio-Canada or the ethics guide of the Quebec Press Council. However, the media outlet would need a code, even one scribbled on a piece of paper, that reflects its commitment to complying with the guiding principles of journalism.
I think this should offer some comfort to people who think that Bill C‑18 will favour certain large media outlets that they believe show a bias for the government and could act as a conduit for the government's opinions.
I do not think that what I am about to say will be a big surprise to members who did not participate in the debates on Bill C-18. My Conservative friends were not very supportive of this bill and they do not generally like what we call the mainstream media, the major news media outlets. I am talking about traditional media companies like CBC/Radio-Canada, Vidéotron, Bell Media and Québecor, of course. I am talking about these major companies that produce the news. The Conservatives find them biased because, in general, they take positions that are not relayed as the Conservatives would like, for all sorts of reasons. Generally, the populist spin gets filtered out in the mainstream media, which adopt journalistic standards and adhere to broad journalistic principles.
I will now digress briefly, since we are talking about CBC/Radio-Canada. I know someone who has worked in the news service for a good part of his career and who received complaints from the public. On the French side, Quebec separatists have often accused Radio-Canada of being federalist and not reporting the news or doing so in a biased way when it comes to the separatist cause. Conversely, Quebec federalists find that Radio-Canada is a gang of separatists. This person I know told me that when it comes to the news, if he receives the same number of complaints from people who complain that they are being too federalist relative to those who complain that they are being too separatist, he feels that they did a good job, that they worked objectively and that they were “on the right track,” as my friend, the House leader of the Bloc Québécois and member for La Prairie might say. In short, it is all a matter of perception.
However, there is something that is different about the mainstream media. I do not want to advocate for CBC/Radio-Canada, but in general, these major media companies are objective. Obviously we see biases from time to time, but not serious ones. These major media outlets must change course and correct the situation when they make a mistake, when they err, when they are, for example, partisan, or biased, or handle a news item badly. They all have mechanisms for receiving complaints, processing them and making retractions as needed. Knowing how to make retractions after recognizing that a mistake was made is also one of the major principles of journalism.
I am talking about mainstream media, but I also spoke earlier about the new media, new forms of news media that we have seen emerge, media of all kinds. There is a lot of opinion news, as I said. I wondered whether these media had to be neglected. The answer is obviously no.
Changes are happening in the news sector. Everyone acknowledged that when we studied Bill C‑18. A lot has changed. The fact is that news companies need to adapt, transition to digital technologies and make sure they reach people where they are.
Consumer habits have changed in recent years when it comes to the news. People get their news on social media. They go on Facebook, for example, or they search for a particular piece of news or subject using Google. These are now the ways we get our news. What is more, these outlets and general content companies sell huge amounts of advertising, since 80% of advertising is said to now be in the digital sector. I think it is normal that these outlets and these companies, which profit heavily from the news sector and the content generated by newsrooms, contribute to the content they are benefiting from. It is the least they can do.
I am well aware of the fact that Bill C‑18 will not solve all the issues with the news sector, the media in general and culture, the latter being addressed more specifically in Bill C‑11. Bill C‑18 will not solve everything. There will still be problems and challenges. In my opinion, it is normal that governments come to the aid of a sector as fragile as the news sector. It is a fragile sector, but it is essential.
Clearly, we will need more tools to help the media. That is obvious. The fund the Bloc Québécois is proposing would be a very effective tool, allowing us to collect royalties from the digital giants that are making outrageous profits and use them to support more fragile media, such as regional media. I think that would be a good solution.
Once again, the Bloc Québécois is the party proposing solutions rather than simply opposing suggestions and obstructing Parliament. I would be very pleased to discuss this with my colleagues and to make a more detailed proposal to the government.
The House resumed from June 19 consideration of the motion respecting Senate amendments to Bill C-18, An Act respecting online communications platforms that make news content available to persons in Canada, and of the amendment.
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
Madam. Speaker, I do listen to what is happening in the committee. It is very important for me, being the Minister of Canadian Heritage. I have a lot of respect for the work of the committee, and I have had the chance to go committee many times.
However, there are many programs for local papers. As I said before, there is the tax credit on labour, local journalism initiatives, especially for small communities. There is the Canada periodical fund. We are open to work with the other parties to come up with other solutions. However, Bill C-18 is one of those solutions. It is there, it is ready, it has been studied in the House and in the Senate. It is time we move on.
Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC
Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois will be delighted to hear what I have to say.
My colleague just said that he supported the concept of closure when the bill is essential. Bill C‑18 is certainly essential to our newsrooms across Quebec and Canada.
The Bloc Québécois members ultimately lack that little bit of courage to say that it is important for them, even if it is no fun to limit debate. No one likes it, and no one got into politics to invoke closure. At the end of the day, they just do not have the courage to say that this step is necessary to get the bill.
Right now, they want Bill C‑18, but they do not want to do anything to help the government pass the bill. They do not want to help. They could stand up today, vote with the government and the NDP, and show how important it is to pass it before the summer break. If they do not do that, then the Conservatives will block it all week.